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MAMMY JINNY^ 
CHRISTMAS 
HOME-COMING 










Mammy yinny s Christmas 
Home-Coming 








“MAMMY JINNY” 

“— A'iid she could see everything that went on in 
the back yard” 



MAMMY JINNY’S 
CH RISTMAS 
HOME-COMING 

BY FRANCES S.^^ORCHER ^ 



PUBLISHED BY 
THE J. W. BURKE COMPANY 
MACON. GEORGIA 











Copyright, 1927 
By Frances S. Porcher 


JUL1 177 



©Cl A990925^ 



FOREWORD 


Ceveral years ago, when the author enjoyed the 
honor and privilege of being associated with the 
late Wm. Marion Reedy in the conduct of the St. 
Louis Mirror, she was called upon suddenly by him 
for an extra emergency story and found it easier and 
quicker to condense the memoranda she had intended 
for a little Christmas book into a short story, which 
she called “Mammy Jinny”, in which the main points 
of this little book were used. 

It was a sort of dernier ressort at the time, and as 
an accommodation to the kindest and most charming 
of editorial chiefs. 

But now as we are getting further and further 
away from the almost feudal spirit of days which 
had their sunny gleams to illuminate much that was 
dark and we, who are a generation nearer to its 
memories, realize how utterly unreal it will all be to 
our own descendants, it seems as if the true incidents 
and real pictures of those times are worthy of a 
place in our Americana. And the incidents in this 
story are literally true. 

Mammy Jinny lived to be over ninety and the 
children of her former master continued his service 
to her when he could no longer give it. And so I 
have taken my first notes and a copy of the Mirror 
story and, at this late day have tried, however in¬ 
efficiently, to produce the little Christmas book which 
Mr. Reedy sidetracked for me so long ago. If it is 
found worthy to fill a niche—however tiny—in the 
records of a Past that will seem as legendary to our 
grandchildren as a Norse Saga does to us, its pur¬ 
pose will be accomplished. 

F;RA5j^es S. Porcher. 




CONTENTS 


ILLUSTRATIONS 

PAGE 

Mammy Jinny _ frontispiece 

Uncle Manuel, the Head Gardener _l6 

Chloe - 26 

Mammy Jinny's Cabin _66 

Chapter I-ii 

Chapter II_25. 

Chapter III_;-45. 

Chapter IV_!_51 

Chapter V -- 61; 















I 


Mammy yinnys'^ Christmas 
Home-Coming 



Mammy Jinny’s Christmas 


Home-Coming 


An’ I wisht I hed a bin dar— 

An’ I wisht I hed a bin dar— 

To march all ’roun’ de gret white throne, 
An’ I wisht I hed a bin dar. 


My Mudder’s dar— 
My Fadder’s— 



FORE continuing the refrain, which 


followed an itemization of all the dead 
relatives and all the prophets and apostles, 
time enough being given for the recital. 
Mammy broke off suddenly the wail of minor 
notes, to send forth most stentorian, not to 
say harsh, orders to a group of children lux¬ 
uriating in a sandpile within her range of 
vision: 

“You, Ed’ard, an’ Dick an’ Little Fanny 
an’ Jinny, ef I sees any mo’ ob dat dirt- 
throwin’ in yo’ ha’r an’ up in de ar’ ’ginst de 
clo’es line, whar Mass Newman’s shuts is a 
dryin’, I won’t wait fer yer Mas to git home 
to spank yo’; Fll do it myself with a switch 
offen dat peach tree over dar. An’ whar is 
dat good-fer-nuttin’ nigger Ma’ay, what’s 
( 13 ) 



14 MAMMY JINNY’S CHRISTMAS 

set to watch yuh all? I wisht Mass New- 
man’d git rid o’ her er sell her er somepin; 
she ain’t wort’ her salt.” 

Now as “Mass Newman” belonged to the 
class of slave-holding Virginians, who in¬ 
herited their slaves and added to them by 
purchase when needed, but would never sell 
one (a funny distinction, but true), the 
threat brought forth only a combined laugh 
from the four white children in the sandpile 
and from the recalcitrant Mary, back in a 
secluded corner, busily filling herself with 
half ripe peaches. 

But the sand-throwing stopped, for well 
each youngster knew that Mammy Jinny was 
not only capable of carrying out her threat, 
but that she could always count on the back¬ 
ing of “Mass Newman” and the other ruling 
powers incarnated in the persons of their 
respective parents. 

“I wish Mammy Jinny was dead”, mut¬ 
tered Edward, a fiery-eyed, black-haired boy 
of past eleven, whose hero was Napoleon 
Bonaparte and whose ambition was to be just 





HOME COMING 


15 

like him, and who had a sneaking notion that 
he looked like the Little Corporal. 

“Oh—ain’t you ’shamed?” said his nine- 
year-old cousin, the “Little Fanny” of Mam¬ 
my’s tirade. 

“/ don’t”, said Dick, nearly ten, his young 
brother, “ ’cause she’s a good Mammy and 
Father says so.” 

Jennie, the yellow haired seven-year-old 
sister, was just then too busy filling a little 
tin cake pan with sand, for her pet doll’s din¬ 
ner, to have any feeling in the matter what¬ 
soever. What Mammy said— went^ when 
the mothers were out calling, as they were 
today, so what was the use of getting mad 
about it? Besides Mammy always sat on 
the steps of the kitchen porch, under the 
vines, when she wasn’t making the bread 
(and that was all she ever did except wash 
“Mass Newman’s shuts,” a privilege she 
claimed for herself alone), and she could see 
everything that went on in the back yard, so 
what was the use of making a fuss about it 
like Edward always did? 

A philosophic soul was Jane Ellis, when 






UNCLE MANUEL, THE HEAD GARDENER 



HOME COMING_ IJ 

her middle name was included, which it gen¬ 
erally was when her elders wanted to make a 
command emphatic, and she did not approve 
of being jarred out of the even tenor of her 
way “nohow”. 

This was in the last days of the Civil War, 
when Lee’s forces were dwindling and Appo¬ 
mattox was coming nearer and nearer on the 
skyline against the horizon. Jackson’s brave 
soul was at rest, and the Valley of Virginia 
had been devastated by German mercenaries 
and everybody, women, children and serv¬ 
ants, was very hungry and illy clothed. On 
this very afternoon the two sisters, who 
shared one bonnet with another intimate 
friend, had borrowed a second piece of head- 
gear and gone out to pay a few calls much in 
arrears. This hat shortage was why only 
one of these ladies was ever seen at church on 
the same Sunday, an open secret but not men¬ 
tioned because too many other ladies were 
guilty of the same arrangement, some even 
going so far as to exchange and borrow 
dresses when sizes permitted. 

And yet, to the children, these were not 





18 MAMMY JINNY^S CHRISTMAS 

bad days. They had as much to eat as their 
elders themselves could possibly do without. 
The children and servants were the two 
classes of dependents who had to be fed out 
of the slim rations apportioned to the house¬ 
hold. The two mothers were daily growing 
slenderer and paler but bravely held up their 
heads because of a hope and a prayer in their 
hearts that the two men of the family would 
come through all right—alive at least. One 
of these was with Lee, and the other in the 
Southern Division under Cabell. It was this 
prayer and this hope that saved all the wives 
and mothers on both sides of the Mason and 
Dixon line, in the terrible days of ’64 and 
’65, when both sides were weary of fighting, 
unutterably weary, of the fratricidal strife, 
and one side was gasping in the throes of dis¬ 
solution. 

And so Edward strutted and waved his 
^‘Little Corporal’s” sword and wore his tri- 
color-of-France sash and tyrannized over his 
brother and cousin, who had to represent the 
Army of France. These became very tired 
of it at times and finally broke into open re- 





HOME COMING 

bellion, culminating in the insult of calling 
him “Nappy” to his face, in flagrant derision, 
an insult that sunk so deeply in his soul, I 
doubt if it was ever eradicated. The way of 
it was this: the house was built on a hill that 
sloped down in terraces to the garden at its 
foot and there were sixty stone steps, down 
which Unc’ Manuel had to go with his young¬ 
er helpers, to cultivate the soil and gather 
the vegetables. Beyond the garden limits 
was a narrow strip of swamp land, separated 
by a low stone wall from Unc’ Manuel’s do¬ 
main. There was a law, laid down by the 
powers up in the “Big House,” that made that 
wall the absolute limit for the wanderings of 
the children. They might sit on it and look 
over it and long to explore its wetness and to 
gather its moss and believe all of Mary’s 
lurid tales about it, of snakes “an’ sco’pions” 
and even devils “an’ hants”, but “thus far 
and no farther” were the words of the edict. 
Naturally the swamp was the most fascinating 
spot on earth. 

There was a most gorgeous red flower 
that grew there, which “Little Fanny” would 





20 MAMMY JINNY^S CHRISTMAS 

cheerfully have sold her immortal soul for, 
and did almost break up her fragile body in 
trying to reach it, without getting beyond the 
prescribed bounds. 

Now Edward, who had soaked his imagi¬ 
nation to the limit in the Napoleonic obses¬ 
sion and who was naturally a courageous 
soul, could“illy brook the idea of limitations. 
To him a wall represented the outward sym¬ 
bol of somebody’s inward tyranny; not for 
nothing had he puzzled over the ^^Sic semper 
tyrannW^ of the great seal of Virginia, at the 
bottom of his father’s framed college di¬ 
ploma. So it was that upon one beautiful 
spring day, when the swamp seemed to fairly 
breathe out allurement and to send out ten¬ 
tacles, which drew one, willy nilly, nearer 
and yet nearer into her beautiful, if treach¬ 
erous, bosom, and when, best of all, old Unc’ 
Manuel had a “misery” in his back and his 
youthful myrmidons had concluded to lay-off 
too, so that the children had the garden to 
themselves, the Junior Bonaparte called upon 
the Army of France to cross the Alps at his 





HOME COMING_21 

heels, as personified in an exploration of the 
swamp. 

Before giving his orders he had his fol¬ 
lowers repeat the ceremony, often indulged 
in, I admit, of its Oath of Allegiance to its 
great Commander, which consisted in kneel¬ 
ing abjectly down and grasping the cross-hilt 
of the sword, of which the famous General 
held the point, and repeating a formula full 
of “I-wish-I-may-die” and interspersed with 
various choice oaths culled from Mary’s vo¬ 
cabulary, “if ever, ever^ EVER” he or she, 
impersonating the Army of France, which 
had followed its wonderful Leader to victory 
over mountains, through rivers, through 
snow and every other imaginable barrier, 
“should hesitate to obey ANY ORDER 
WHATSOEVER even unto DEATH”. 
Furthermore an inviolable secrecy was 
pledged even in the face of possible tortures 
or fires of martyrdom. Oh, it was a great 
oath, and Little Fanny rolled it under her 
tongue, while cold shivers of delightful fear 
went playing hide and seek up and down her 
spinal column. So much for the Oath. 





22 MAMMY JINNY’S CHRISTMAS 

On this occasion it was taken with all the 
frills but there was an unusual sternness and 
solemnity upon the part of the Great Leader, 
without, however, arousing any suspicion 
upon the part of the Army, it being used to 
bombastic flights of eloquence with accom¬ 
panying mannerisms from “Nappy”, in cer¬ 
tain intensive moods. 

But when the Little Corporal divulged 
that the “Alps to be crossed” meant in other 
words to explore the swamp, at his heels, 
with eyes upon his uplifted sword, upon 
whose hilt they had just vowed an oath of 
fealty impossible to falsify, then the whole 
united Army of France, without one dissent¬ 
ing voice, gave pause and vocally rebelled. 
Moreover, Little Fanny like the rest of her 
inexplicable and undependable sex, went as 
far as human treason could go and, not only 
refused to follow, saying “Old Nappy, old 
Nappy; you think you ’re big don’t you?” but 
announced her determination to go as fast as 
her feet could carry her up the sixty stone 
steps and “tell Mamma and Aunt Carrie 
what Edward is going to do”. 





HOME COMING^ 

Gone, on the wings of the sweet summer 
air, blowing toward the Tobacco Row 
Mountains, was all the dignity and solemnity 
of the famous oath; buried in oblivion’s 
depths the “hope-I-may-dies, etc.,” and there 
was left only the pathetic, little figure in his 
cocked hat and tri-colored sash, as was his 
prototype at Elba—alone, “with none so 
poor to do him reverence”. 

Of course a wordy war had followed the 
defection of the troops, after which Edward 
had resigned from the head of the French 
Army and sworn he’d never so far forget 
himself again as “to play with babies and 
girls, who didn’t know anything anyhow and 
never read anything but fairy stories and 
were just plain ’fraid cats and tell-tales—so 

NOW.” 

Then Little Fanny, tagged by the dis¬ 
graced Dick, panted up the garden steps and 
told her tale—to her doll, and the erstwhile 
Bonaparte stood with folded arms for at 
least five minutes and imagined he was on 
Elba, by posing on the wall under a pine 
tree. Finally he went up to the house, and 





24 MAMMY JINNY’S CHRISTMAS 


Stretched out on his stomach, under the big i 
library table, with the little, thick, squatty |i 
Peter Parley’s History of the World, which 
was always a recourse and an unfailing re-« 
source in times of trouble. I 











II 


Mammy Jinny^s Christmas 
Home-Coming 



“Gittin" Uigion?’^ scornfully repeated Chloe, ’sif 
Mammy hedn't done git ’ligion ’fore yuh was horned, 
nigger.” 




Mammy Jinny’s Christmas 
Home-Coming 


“An’ I wisht I hed a bin dar— 

An’ I wisht I hed a bin dar— 

To march all ’roun’ de gret white throne, 

An’ I wisht I hed a bin dar.” 

jyjl^AMMY JINNY sat in front of the 
smouldering embers of the big open 
fireplace in her cabin—the best in the “quar¬ 
ters”—and crooned again, over and over to 
herself the refrain of her favorite negro 
camp-meeting song. But she was not think¬ 
ing of the song, nor of camp-meeting. If she 
had Been occupied with either one or the 
other she would not have crooned, but the 
full measure of melody would have fallen 
from her lips, old as she was, with all the 
verve of youth. And she would have sung 
all about the various saints and her deceased 
relatives, in that wonderful procession 
“ ’roun’ de gret white throne”, through verse 
after verse, repeating the wish, that she “hed 
a bin dar,” after each stanza. 

But the refrain was mechanical, and she 
( 27 ) 



28 MAMMY JINNY’S CHRISTMAS 

sat, bent forward, with her elbows upon her 
knees, half rocking back and forth, her pipe 
burnt out and her eyes half shut. One of the 
young negroes came to the door and peeped 
in, then ran back to her companions: “Mam¬ 
my is a-stedyin’ ’bout sumpin”, she said, “an’ 
I don’t dast to bodder her.” 

“What yuh s’pect she a-stedyin’ ’bout?” 
asked a bright looking girl, with a crowing, 
kicking pickaninny in her arms. “ ’Bout git- 
tin’ ’ligion?” 

“Gittin’ ’ligion?” scornfully repeated 
Chloe, the first speaker. “ ’Sif Mammy 
hedn’t done git ’ligion ’fore yuh was horned, 
nigger. I don’ know what Mammy stedyin’ 
’bout, less’n tis dis gret talk ’bout de new 
Freedom dat Massa done tole us ’bout.” 

Mary, the girl with the baby in her arms, 
drew nearer to Chloe, and dropped her voice 
almost to a whisper, as, with a half-awed in¬ 
flection, she queried*^ 

“What yuh think Mammy goin’ do ’bout 
Reuben, Chloe?” 

“I dunno an’ I don’ keer,” replied Chloe 
flippantly, full of the importance of having 





HOME COMING^ 

her opinions deferred to, “I hear Miss Kit¬ 
ty’s bell a ringin’ an’ I’ll tell yuh mo’ when I 
comes back”, and off pranced Chloe, leaving 
Mary to grapple alone with the question of 
Mammy and Reuben. 

Meanwhile a fine-looking, broad should¬ 
ered mulatto man had walked across from 
the road to the “quarters” and entered Mam¬ 
my’s cabin, with an air of proprietorship. 

Mammy did not look up; she went on 
crooning in a minor key and gently swaying 
her body back and forth. Reuben strode over 
to the fireplace. 

“Settin’ in de ashes as ushal, ole Ooman,” 
he said with a sneer in his voice. 

The old woman started a little and 
dropped her pipe on the hearth. “ ’Fore 
Gawd, Reuben, I didn’t think it wuz yuh; 
when yuh come f’um Richmon’, honey?” 

“I jes got heah”, and then, after a pause, 
“I s’pose yuh dun heah de good news?” 

“ ’Bout de freedom?” asked Mammy, 
groping in the ashes after her pipe. “Yaas, 
I dun heah daf\ 





30 MAMMY JINNY^S CHRISTMAS 

“Good Gawd, Ooman,” demanded Reub¬ 
en, “what fur yuh talk laik dat?” 

“Laik whut?” asked Mammy, who had 
found her pipe and was now balancing a red 
coal of fire upon its bowl. 

“Laik as if freedom didn’ mean nuthin’; 
laik yuh wuz usen to bein’ free ev’ey day ob 
yuh life—dat’s whut”, and Reuben swelled 
with importance as he looked down on the 
little shrivelled creature, twenty-five years 
his elder, that he had made his wife some ten 
years before. 

Just why he had wanted Mammy had been 
a mystery to his master. Doctor Steptoe, 
owner of “The Pines” and slaves galore, but 
Mammy wanted him as ardently as he 
seemed to desire her, and, being the most in¬ 
dulgent of masters. Dr. Steptoe had finally 
consented and the biggest wedding ever 
known upon the plantation had been the re¬ 
sult. 

Reuben had not been one of the inherited 
slaves but had been purchased as a child 
when the breaking up of a family had put 
him on the market. Mammy had been the 





HOME COMING^ 

personal maid of the doctor’s mother before 
he was born and had lost her own baby just 
about the time the doctor and his twin 
brother came into the world. There was a 
dearth of nourishment for the two babies, so 
Mammy Jinny became his maternal fount 
and a tie was cemented then and there, be¬ 
tween nurse and baby, master and slave, that 
only deepened and strengthened as the years 
passed on. 

She had always reigned as a queen among 
the other servants, and now it had been a 
long period since the old woman had been ex¬ 
pected to do anything but supervise the 
younger negroes. One duty which she point 
blank refused to delegate to any other serv¬ 
ant was the bread making. 

“Nobody shell ever mek rolls an’ biskit fer 
Mass Newman while my bed’s hot,” had 
been her decree and nobody disputed her 
authority, and another reserved privilege had 
been the laundering of her master’s fine 
shirts. 

“Mass Newman” had once thought to 
surprise the faithful old woman and to 





32 MAMMY JINNY^S CHRISTMAS 

lighten her labors by closing up the cavernous 
old fireplace, with its pot-hooks and hangers, 
and, in furtherance of this scheme, had im¬ 
ported a cook-stove from Washington or 
Baltimore. Mammy was heart-broken. She 
hobbled into the library, upon the arrival of 
the cast-iron monster, and called her master 
to account. 

“Mass Newman,” she demanded, “ain’t 
my bread an’ cookin’ good enough fer yuh 
yet, or is yuh gittin’ so highfalutin’ dat de 
ole mammy dat dun wet nuss yuh at her bress, 
her own bress, cayn’t please yuh no longer?” 

“'Why, God bless your good old soul. 
Mammy,” he had protested, “there is no¬ 
body’s bread like the bread I was raised on, 
from your own special brew of ash-cake to 
the big salt-risin’ loaf you make on Satur¬ 
day for Sunday dinner. And I’ll take my 
oath, Mammy, that your equal on corn 
pones and biscuit does not exist from the 
Mason and Dixon line to the Creole quar¬ 
ters of New Orleans.” 

“Now, go ’long. Mass Newman,” insisted 
the half-mollified and wholly delighted old 







HOME COMING 

33 


servant; “dat’s all right to talk comp’mens 
to yo ole Mammy, but dat ain’t whut I come 
a-climbin’ up dose steps, wid a misery in my 
back, fer.” 

Doctor Steptoe went out of the room and 
returned with a glass of wine in his hand. 
“Here, Mammy,” he said, “this will cure 
the misery. Come, drink it down and then 
tell me what all this fuss is about in the 
kitchen.” 

“Your health, Marster,” and the little old 
woman bowed over the glass, after which 
she proceeded to register a solemn and vig¬ 
orous protest against the stove. 

No arguments could convince her that a 
cook-stove was anything short of an invent¬ 
ion of the Devil (in capital letters) or, that 
the presence of one meant anything less than 
an aspersion upon her own transcendent abil¬ 
ities as a bread maker and supervisor of 
general cookery. 

As might have been expected, the confer¬ 
ence closed, with Mammy victorious and her 
master surrendered completely, when he 
finally said: “Go on. Mammy, and break 





34 MAMMY JINNY’S CHRISTMAS 

your poor old back, if you want to, over pot¬ 
hooks and cranes; I wash my hands of the 
whole business.” 

“Thankee, Mass Newman, thankee,” 
answered Mammy in a broad grin, “An’ 
whut mus’ I do wid dat stove now?” 

“I don’t care what,” replied Doctor Step- 
toe, as he turned to his writing-table, “I 
bought it for you and you can throw it in the 
^Jeems’ if you like.” 

But it was not thrown into the classic 
waters of the James. 

These incidents occurred a year or two be¬ 
fore the shot at Sumter had set the world’s 
echoes rolling, and now Lee had surrendered 
to Grant upon the field at Appomattox and 
in a dark corner of the smoke-house the stove 
still reposed in its original.crate, yellow with 
the rust of years, while the bread for the 
Steptoe table was baked in the fireplace, 
where bread for Steptoes had been baked 
from father to son, for generation after gen¬ 
eration. 

It was the same woman, tenacious of the 
old ways, that had looked up at her husband 







HOME COMING 

35 


and asked laconically: “Laik whut?” a ques¬ 
tion that had called forth his contempt. And 
then she went on: “ ’Tain’t nuthin’ new—all 
this heah freedom talk. Mass Newman done 
tole us all ’bout it when Mass Abyum Linkum 
made a ’mancipation ’ritin’, an’ he sed we 
could go den, but nobody ob his niggers want¬ 
ed ter go ’ceptin’ t’wus dat low-down Jim dat 
ain’t no better dan pore-white trash, an’ he 
done cum a-creepin’ back fer Mass Newman 
to doctor him up.” 

“Well,” answered Reuben, “it’s diffrunt 
now. De fightin’ is ended an’ you an’ I is jest 
ez good as Marster an’ Mistis; we is free an’ 
nobody kin say ‘do dis’ or ‘do dat’. ” 

“ ’Tain’t much if we is free^\ persisted the 
old woman between long drawn puffs at her 
pipe. “I done always been free ez I wanted 
ter be, an’ Massa dun always ’lowed yuh part 
ob eberyting yuh made hirin’ out at de hotel 
in Richmon’, an’ yuh could a-bought yo 
freedom an’ mine too outen ob what yuh 
sabed ef yuh’d wanted ter, a long time ago.” 

The mulatto scowled an ugly, almost 
murderous scowl and then he changed his 





36 MAMMY JINNY’S CHRISTMAS 

tactics. “I’m glad yuh is so well pleased to 
be yo Marster’s nigger an’ leave yo husban’: 
I’m glad ^^—with an air of aggrieved dignity 
—^^thet yore kine of ’ligion let’s wives giv up 
dar husban’s. I usen ter think it wuz diffrunt, 
but I reckin all ^ligion an’ all wimmin is 
alike.” 

This was more than Mammy could stand; 
in her heart of hearts she adored the brown 
skinned stalwart man, who was young enough 
to be her son and yet who had chosen to be 
her husband, and, moreover, she was con¬ 
scientious to a fault as to the strict and literal 
exercise of her creed. Duty had been the 
watchword of the faithful old soul, who had 
never faltered in following its mandates, and 
beneath whose ebony skin beat a heart of 
gold, for a soul as white as snow. The tears 
sprang to her eyes and silently coursed down 
her wrinkled cheeks. 

^^Leahe my husban\ Reuben,” she sobbed, 
“did yuh tink / wouldT^ 

“Well, it looks dat a-way. Jinny, when yuh 
talks laik yuh duz ’bout freedom.” 

“Oh, well, Reuben,” and she picked up the 





HOME COMING 


37 

corner of the white neckerchief, that she wore 
crossed over her breast, and furtively wiped 
her eyes. “I hates ter giv up Mass Newman 
an’ Mistis.” 

“Dey ain’t no Marsters an’ Mistises now”, 
broke in Reuben, but she let that pass un¬ 
heeded, and went on: “I dun nuss Mass New¬ 
man at my bress, when Ole Mistis didn’ hev 
no milk fer him an’ my baby died, an’ he dun 
bin laik my own chile ever sence. He ain’t 
never give me a cross word; he ain’t never 
sold any uv his people; he never let no ober- 
seer beat none ob his niggers an’ he done 
took keer ob us in sickness an’ in belt’, laik I 
heerd ’em read in de prar-book wen Miss 
Alice mahied Cap’n Phelps. I ain’t got no 
call ter leave Mass Newman an’ I’m gittin’ 
too ole to be tuk up, like a grape-bine an’^ 
toted ter strange groun’ ”. 

“Then stay with yer Mass Newman an’ be 
damned ter yuh,” thundered Reuben. 

For the first time a flash of anger lit up the 
woman’s eyes: “Don’ cuss at me, Reuben, 
she said with a dignity that almost abashed 
him. “Mass Newman hissef neber dun dat.. 





38 MAMMY JINNY^S CHRISTMAS 

Jes gib me time ter finish. I wuz agoin’ ter 
say dat still I am willin’ and specs to do my 
proper duty ter my husban’; an’ now, Reub¬ 
en, what does yuh want me ter doT'" 

“Go ter Richmon’ termorrer.” 

“Termorrer,” she gasped in surprise: “an’ 
most all de niggers dun gone a’ready an’ no- 
boddy heah to ha’f cook fer Marster?” 

“Thet’s whut I sed,” answered Reuben as 
he turned on his heel and went out of the 
cabin. 

Doctor Steptoe was sitting in his library, 
staring gloomily at a column of figures, when 
Mammy tapped at his door half an hour 
later. 

“Sit down. Mammy, he said pushing a 
chair toward her; “I see Reuben is back 
home; what’s the news?” 

“He’s gwine ter tek me ter Richmon’ ter¬ 
morrer, Mass Newman, an’ I cum ter tell 
yuh.” 

Doctor Steptoe sprang to his feet and 
made a turn or two across the room. He had 
raised a company early in the struggle and 





HOME COMING^ 

entered into the campaign as part of the 
army of Northern Virginia, but, in the last 
year of the war had been forced to retire 
from service on furlough, while recovering 
from a dangerous wound. He was still very 
frail and the color came and went in his pale 
cheeks during his nervous walk across the 
room. 

“Mammy,” he said finally, “I have not 
said anything to the rest of the servants ex¬ 
cept to tell them that if any of them wanted 
to stay at ‘The Pines’ or wherever we will be, 
I would do the best I could for them, but it 
is different with you. You are seventy years 
old and you are not used to roughing it in a 
strange place among strange people; stay 
with us. Mammy, and while we have a roof 
or crust of bread we will share it with you. 
You nursed me, you have nursed our child¬ 
ren, you have served us faithfully, and now in 
your old age we will take care of you. I do 
not trust Reuben when he takes you away 
from me.” 

“Mass Newman”, and a tender quaver 
came into her voice, “I sho’ don’t want ter 





40 MAMMY JINNY^S CHRISTMAS 

go, but I dun ma’ay Reuben an’ yuh knows 
what de Good Book says ’bout husban’s an’ 
wives, Mass Newman; yuh wouldn’ go 
against de Bible, would yuh? I dun give 
Reuben my promise ’fore Gawd an’ de work, 
an’ now I is got to foller whar he wants to 
tek me; ef it is troo de fiery furnis. Mass 
Newman; I is got ter, till I draps—dat’s all.” 

The homely black face was irradiated with 
that inner light of self-abnegation, that 
shines in certain souls, regardless of creed or 
color, and Doctor Steptoe, or rather. Captain 
Steptoe, as he was better known in later 
years, came to the side of the little old 
negress and took her right hand in both of his 
own. He held it tightly and something like a 
drop of rain fell upon the forehead of his old 
nurse. 

“Don’t, Mass Newman,” she protested as 
her own tears fell. 

“God bless you. Mammy,” he answered 
solemnly, “and keep you and cause His face 
to shine upon you, wherever you may go, and 
if ever you need a friend, send for your old 
master.” 





HOME COMING_H 

“I’ll go and see Mistis now,” she said, and 
she hobbled out upon her rheumatic feet, 
closing the door very gently. Captain Step- 
toe dropped down wearily again before the 
columns of figures, which represented an al¬ 
most hopeless outlook for his financial future, 
and buried his face in his hands. 

Mammy’s announcement was no real sur¬ 
prise to Mrs. Steptoe, who was nursing at 
her breast the small baby, as she had long 
distrusted Reuben and feared just such a 
move upon his part. She too pleaded with the 
old woman until she realized that her en¬ 
treaties only added to the bitter sorrow in 
Mammy’s heart, and with one final effort she 
desisted. 

“Ah, well, Mammy,” she said as she lifted 
Baby Evelyn from her own breast and placed 
her gently in Mammy’s lap, while she drew 
the two boys, who were standing by with 
puzzled faces listening to the conversation, 
to either side of her; “You may leave us, but 
how can you leave your babies?” 

Whereupon poor Mammy could bear no 





42 MAMMY JINNY^S CHRISTMAS 

more, but broke down completely and, hast¬ 
ily giving back the little one to her mother, 
hurried away as fast as her crippled feet 
could carry her, her apron corner held to her 
eyes. 

As for Edward and Dick, as soon as the 
truth dawned upon them, they burst into tears 
and refused to be comforted. Every childish 
quarrel they had ever had with Mammy 
passed out of their memory. 

It had been scarcely eight weeks since the 
two of them had sworn upon the hilt of their 
father’s sword—purloined for the purpose— 
to throw off the yoke of Mammy’s tyranny 
and never, never again submit to her oppres¬ 
sion. If they wanted to have a sand battle, 
while the shirts were drying on the line, they 
would have it in future, and not besmirch 
their manhood by cowardly running out of 
the reach of the peach-tree switch that Mam¬ 
my had often wielded with good effect upon 
their noble bodies. No, they would form an 
alliance, offensive and defensive, and let 
Mammy know that, while she might rule the 
rest of the plantation, including their weakly. 





HOME COMING^ 

short-sighted parents, they had thrown off 
the oppressor’s yoke; they were henceforth 
bound by their oath of knighthood to be free, 
free, FREE. 

But things suddenly seemed to wear a dif¬ 
ferent aspect; it appeared as if it were Mam¬ 
my who was free, not only free but going 
away, incomprehensible fact, to leave them. 

And so the tyranny and the peach-tree 
switch alike faded away and other memories 
began to crowd in, after the manner of mem¬ 
ories, which have an inconvenient fashion of 
cropping up and reminding us of things that 
will add to our burdens of regret. 

Who, they would like to know, would be 
always ready to roast their apples on a string 
and their chestnuts in the hot ashes on the 
hearth? Who would there be now never too 
tired to tell them wonderful stories of foxes 
and rabbits and mountains and caves and 
“Old Scratch”? When they hurt themselves 
who would tie up their wounds, and, when 
they were put to bed supperless on account of 
some heinous misdemeanor, who would sur¬ 
reptitiously steal in when the family was in 





44 MAMMY JINNY’S CHRISTMAS 

the dining-room, with goodies unspeakably 
comforting to ease the pangs of hunger, and 
mitigate the horrors of exile? Suppose they 
had measles and chicken-pox again, or some 
other terrible disease, could they ever get 
well if Mammy was gone? 

At each new thought the wails came loud¬ 
er and the sobs deeper, and, lo, of the two 
gallant knights, who had sworn a solemn re¬ 
volt against Mammy’s tyranny, there were 
now only left two broken-hearted little boys, 
who had been rocked through babyhood on 
Mammy’s breast, as their father had been 
before them, and who could not comprehend 
a future with Mammy eliminated. 






Mammy ^inny"s Christmas 
Home-Coming 


w ^ 




Mammy Jinny’s Christmas 
Home-Coming 


p][AVING put her hand to the plow Mam¬ 
my was too loyal not to walk to the end 
of the furrow, and so, choking down the 
homesickness that beset her before “The 
Pines” was out of sight and that seemed to 
grind into her soul, with every turn of the iron 
wheels and every snort of the iron monster 
rushing ahead, she turned a smiling face to¬ 
ward Reuben, when they had reached Rich¬ 
mond and the really neat and comfortable 
little frame house, which he proudly pro¬ 
claimed as “home”. 

“Now, what yuh think. Ole Ooman,” he 
said, throwing open the door and displaying 
a bright new rag carpet upon the floor, a big 
rocking chair, a bed with a white counterpane 
on it and, glory of glories, a gaudy wooden 
clock upon the mantel. 

“It sho’ is nice, Reuben, it sho’ is,” repeat¬ 
ed Mammy and, seeing these evidences of his 
love and care around her, her woman’s 
(47) 



48 MAMMY JINNY^S CHRISTMAS 

tender conscience arose in reproach that she 
had, even for a moment, let old affections and 
duties hold her back from her paramount 
wifely duty. Throwing her arms around him 
she sobbed aloud on his breast, weeping away 
her heimweh, in the satisfaction that she was 
by one beloved and shielded. 

Mercifully the tears of the aged do not 
flow long, for, at the sound of steps in the 
next room, Reuben, a little hastily it seemed, 
pushed her away and, by the time Mammy 
had dried her eyes and removed her bonnet, 
was introducing her to a handsome mulatto 
girl, his “fren’. Miss Rosie Belle, who wuz 
goin’ to stay a while twell Mammy hed got 
kinder usened ter city ways.” 

In her soul of souls poor Mammy would 
rather have had no strangers to witness her 
transplanting into this new soil, but her tears 
were too recent and the conscience that had 
provoked them too lately aroused for her to 
do anything but accept cheerfully any ar¬ 
rangement that Reuben had seen fit to make. 

And so, for a few days, she willingly made 







HOME COMING 

49 


her eyes blind to that which she did not want 
to see, and then, as little by little Reuben and 
“Miss Rosie Belle” dropped the mask of 
even common decency, and she had to face 
the fact that she was only a drudge for her 
husband and his mistress; that, for nothing 
else was she brought to Richmond, it seemed 
as if the poor old heart must utterly break. 

But Mammy Jinny had not served the God 
of her faith all the long years for nothing, 
and although the heart-ache and the heart¬ 
break almost seemed as if they could not be 
borne, she still struggled on hugging tightly 
the mad hope and madder fallacy that the 
patience and forgiveness of a wife can over¬ 
come the insolence and passion of a mistress. 

It was years after this, and then only by a 
word at a time, before her former master 
and mistress knew all that Mammy had en¬ 
dured in the “home” to which Reuben had 
taken her with such a blare and blow of 
pride’s trumpets. 

There were days of agony and nights of 
cruelty, when every feeling of regard for 





50 MAMMY JINNY’S CHRISTMAS 

things good and things seemly were wanton¬ 
ly outraged in the old woman’s soul, but she 
lived through them, and, with the self-abne¬ 
gation of a martyr, buried deep every mem¬ 
ory she could, lest some day that which she 
had suffered might rise to her lips and stab 
other souls and torture other hearts as hers 
had been stabbed and tortured. 

She could not write and so, if the tempta¬ 
tion assailed her to call upon her old master 
for help, she, perforce, could not yield to it, 
and besides she knew enough of the man she 
had helped bring up from babyhood, to fear 
that his naturally high temper would break 
beyond bounds if he knew all that she knew. 
“An’ Reuben’s got a awful mean dispersi- 
tion,” she thought, “an’ he’d kill Marster er 
Marster’d kill him, an’ I cayrnt hev no blood 
on my pore old soul when I’m ’mos’ ready 
fer my grabe ennyhow.” 






IV 


Mammy Jinny's Christmas 
Home-Coming 





Mammy Jinny’s Christmas 

Home-Coming 

• 8 ^=& 


pOR six months after Reuben took Mam¬ 
my Jinny to Richmond the household at 
The Pines went through every phase of do¬ 
mestic tribulation. The best servants, drunk 
on their draughts of freedom, and expecting 
farms and mules galore as gratuities from a 
paternal government, scattered to the cities 
to see life while awaiting the realization. A 
few joined a colony to Liberia. Those who 
remained were more of a care than a com¬ 
fort, and, without Mammy’s firm but judi¬ 
cious ruling power, the kitchen forces were 
utterly disorganized. 

It w^as a real relief to Doctor Steptoe that 
so many went away, for the poverty and 
bankruptcy, that were his gleanings from the 
war, left him poorly able to feed the helpless 
negroes. An inheritance from his father, he 
had always looked upon these negroes as a 
grave responsibility, requiring the care given 
ignorant children. He found himself unable 
(53) 




54 MAMMY JINNY^S CHRISTMAS 

to pay the wages such a host of laborers 
would demand and he realized that he must 
learn to manage his corn and tobacco crops 
himself, with a few helpers, and devote as 
much of his time as possible to his profession 
as a chief means of income. 

After six months, however, some of the 
best servants returned and the domestic econ¬ 
omy of “The Pines” was put upon a fairly 
smooth-running basis, so that when Doctor 
Steptoe was called to Richmond, on impor¬ 
tant business, just before Christmas, he found 
time to look up Mammy and carry her a few 
little presents from his wife and the children. 

In a miserable little room in one of the 
poorest hovels of the negro district, he found 
her, after a long search directed by one 
negro after another, who only knew by hear¬ 
say from somebody else, that she was no 
longer in her first place of abode. 

Enveloped in the smoky atmosphere of the 
room, bending over a washtub, she did not 
notice the shadow that darkened her door¬ 
way. Doctor Steptoe observed that she was 
thinner than of old but the handkerchief 







HOME COMING 

55 


across her breast was as spotlessly white as 
ever and her bandanna was as carefully tied 
over her head. She was singing her favorite 
old refrain, as she rubbed the wet garments 
upon the washboard, with a pathetic minor in 
her aged voice, that brought a mist before the 
eyes of her unobserved watcher: 

“I wisht I hed a ben dar— 

An’ I wisht I hed a ben dar— 

Ter march all ’roun’ de gret white throne—” 

and then the weary old creature burst into 
sobs, the dry tearless sobs of age, and 
dropped upon her knees beside the tub: “Oh, 
Marse Jesus”, she prayed, “I done wisht I 
wuz thar right now.'^ 

The man just within the door could stand 
no more. With one stride he was beside the 
faithful old soul, that had held him in her 
arms when he had uttered his initial cry of 
life, and, putting his arms about her, he lifted 
her to the only chair the place afforded. Then 
he dropped upon his knees beside her as he 
had often done when a boy and she had 
smoothed his hair back from his forehead. 

“Marse Newman, Marse Newman, Oh, 





56 MAMMY JINNY’S CHRISTMAS 

Marse Newman,” she repeated, “Is it shore 
yuh? Marse Newman, come to see ole Jin¬ 
ny ’fore she dies?” 

Then, remembering her manners she tried 
to get up and give him the chair, but he gent¬ 
ly pushed her back and seated himself upon 
an upturned box. 

Then he gazed around him and, with a 
look in his eyes that boded no good for Reu¬ 
ben, should he chance to come in, he sternly 
asked, pointing to the tub: “What does this 
mean. Mammy, and where is Reuben?” 

The old woman fumbled nervously at her 
apron. 

“I couldn’t starve. Mass Newman,” she 
began ; 

“Starve, my God—” he interrupted. 

“An’ I ain’t never done steal,” she went 
on, “an’ so I gits a little washin’ in an’ makes 
enuff ter pay fer de room an’ a cawn pone 
ev’ey day, an’ de chillun aroun’ picks me up 
some sticks at de wood yard, and, sometimes, 
de lady, whar I gits de clo’es ter wash, saves 
me a piece of bacon, an’, onct in a while. 
Mass Newman, some ob de young gemmen 





HOME COMING 


57 

lets me hev a pipe ob baccy; so—mos’ days 1 
gits somepin ter eat. I ez all drawde so, 
Marster, wid de rheumatiz dat I cayrn’t wash 
much but I tries to git erlong an’ be hones’, 
laik ole Marster done tole me when I wuz a 
little gal”. 

“But Reuben”, demanded Doctor Steptoe, 
“where is Reuben that you should wash for 
a living and half-starve?” 

“’Fore Gawd, Mass Newman, I dunno. 
Now don’ look thet a way, honey, Don\f kaze 
he ain’t heah no mo’ an’ it wouldn’ do yuh no 
good ter kill ’im. He ain’t wuth it, Marster, 
f’um yiih —deed he ain’t. We hed a good 
house when we fust come ter Richmon’, Mass 
Newman, an’ I thought it wuz mine, but I 
soon foun’ out dere wuz a yaller gal in it, dat 
Reuben fotched me erlong ter do de wuk fer, 
an’ I jest could’n stan’ dat no way, an’ me 
ma’ied ter Reuben by de white folks’ preach¬ 
er, wid de white gown on an’ de ribbin ’roun 
de neck all bangin’ down in front. But I tried 
to be good. Mass Newman, an’ win Reuben 
back, but I could’n an’ den he up an’ tuk de 
tings outen de house an’ lef’ town wid her an’ 







58 MAMMY JINNY^S CHRISTMAS 

I bin a-gittin’ on as bes’ I could eber sence. 
No, I dunno whar he is, Mass Newman, an’ I 
wood’n tell yuh ef I did. De Good Lawd 
done say de vengin’ is His bizness, dat He 
will do de payin’ fer all sich, an’ it ain’t fer 
yuh, chile, ner me, ter go a-meddlin’ wid what 
is His’n.” 

“Maybe you are right. Mammy, but”— 
the remainder of the sentence was left unsaid 
as Doctor Steptoe thrust his right hand into 
his overcoat pocket and clenched his fist there 
as if he were choking some vile and noxious 
serpent to death. Then his brows relaxed and 
the stern lines passed away as he rose to his 
feet and stood in the doorway. 

“How soon can you get ready to go home. 
Mammy?” he asked. 

“Praise Gawd, Mass Newman, is yuh 
gwine ter tek me home?” she said, with the 
tears slowly gathering in her eyes. 

“You didn’t think I’d leave you; did you?” 
he answered. “I don’t know anybody that 
has a better right to you, and, while the old 
times are gone and “The Pines” is no longer 
what it was in my father’s day, I can still 







HOME COMING 

59 


make a living for the mistress and the child¬ 
ren and you, Mammy, and they will be 
mighty glad to see you in the warmest cabin 
corner with your pipe. Now hire some of 
these women around here to finish that wash¬ 
ing; give these few old traps away and I will 
be here in two hours after you, in a hack, to 
catch that afternoon train for home.” 











Mammy yinny'^s Christmas 
Home-Coming 




Mammy Jinny’s Christmas 
Home-Coming 


“J^E-HEE,” cackled Jim, as he drove up 
to the wayside station that Christmas 
Eve and saw the Doctor crossing the plat¬ 
form, laden with bundles and Mammy hob¬ 
bling contentedly along in his wake: “Ke-hee, 
ef dar ain’t ole Mammy fur sho’. Howdy, 
Marse Newman, howdy Mammy; pears laik 
yuh’se a Krismus gif’ dis time. Mammy 
Jinny”. 

Jim had brought a good supper along and 
it was eaten in the surrey, which bumped over 
corduroy roads and was pulled through long 
stretches of red clay and did not reach the 
home avenue of pine trees before ten o’clock 
that night. The whole family had assembled 
upon the piazza at the sound of the wheels 
and the crack of Jim’s whip and, when Doctor 
Steptoe turned and tenderly lifted from the 
vehicle the little old colored woman in a 
black alpaca dress, plaid shawl and poke bon¬ 
net (all gifts of her mistress two years be- 

(63) 



64 MAMMY JINNY^S CHRISTMAS 

fore), the delighted cries of the entire party 
left nothing to be desired in the way of a 
welcome. 

“I thought I would bring you a Christmas 
Gift that would please everybody''^ laughed 
the cheery Doctor as he followed the ex¬ 
cited group into the house, “and now to bed 
every one of you—yes, boys. Mammy and 
all, or Santa Claus will never get a chance to 
come down our chimney.” 

Long before daylight next morning the 
children were up knocking at doors and mak¬ 
ing the halls echo with their yells of “Christ¬ 
mas Gift” as they sought to “catch” their 
elders and the servants before being 
“caught” themselves. 

It was too early in Emancipation Days for 
the old customs to be abolished, and yet it 
was but a sad reflection to Doctor and Mrs. 
Steptoe of former Christmas Days at “The 
Pines.” The sun of the old days had set but 
the horizon was still aglow with its fading 
tints, and so they had tried to make believe 
for one day that the change had never come. 





HOME COMING^ 

and gathered their children and retainers 
about them after the fashion of bygone 
“slavery days”. 

There was but little money for presents, 
but not a soul on the place had been forgot¬ 
ten. The servants, so few now, where there 
had once been such a host, came to the “big 
house” to “drink Mass Newman’s health and 
Mistis’s” and to “ketch” the “Krismus gif’ ” 
that they well knew was awaiting them. 

The children shared their “goodies” and 
ran around to the few tenanted houses in the 
“Quarters” to divide up and to receive fresh 
eggs and chestnuts and chinquepins, which 
had been carefully gathered and stored up 
that the humblest of the former slaves might 
do his reciprocal part in the general joy and 
giving of the season. 

The boys shot off their fire-crackers, under 
Jim’s guidance, who enjoyed it as much as 
they did and altogether it was a most hila¬ 
rious occasion to them, interrupted by sud¬ 
den rushes to the kitchen to see “if Mammy 
was really there” and to hug her frantically. 

It was a quiet Christmas to the Doctor 





i, 



\ > 


MAMMY JINNY’S CABIN 



















HOME COMING 

67 


and his wife. The memory of former abun¬ 
dance and greatness would steal into their 
minds to contrast with their present poverty, 
d'here were so many closed cabins in the 
“Quarters”, so many cold hearths and smoke¬ 
less chimneys, so many familiar faces lack¬ 
ing. 

Only one or two neighbors had dropped 
in to exchange greetings, where once the rack 
had held a horse hitched to every hook, and 
not a carriage had driven up the avenue, 
where once there were carriages coming and 
going all the day long, with the music of 
happy voices all about. Every Christmas 
during the war had been a quieter and sadder 
season, but while the old servants were there 
with their childlike optimism, there was at 
least plenty of joyful noise abroad in the 
land. But now, upon every adjoining home 
the blight of the cruel strife so recently ended 
was apparent. In most of them were vacant 
chairs. 

But Doctor Steptoe had fared better than 
many of his neighbors in many ways and, 
though the day was quiet and the oppression 






68 MAMMY JINNY^S CHRISTMAS 

of memory was upon their spirits, it was 
after all a happy Christmas. 

They did not realize quite how happy un¬ 
til that night after the children had been put 
to bed and Mammy Jinny had gone the 
rounds tucking in each one with a “Bre’r 
Rabbit” story as a nightcap, and the happy 
old soul turned back on her way to her old 
home in the “Quarters” for the night and 
entered the library where the Doctor and 
Mrs. Steptoe sat: “I done come back ter my 
own, Mass Newman an’ Mistis,” she said, 
“an’ I prays de good Gawd dat w’en yuh is 
old an’ lef’ alone He’ll tek cyar oh yuh too, 
an’ bring yuh safe ter yuh own at las’!” 








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